


Box of Doom

by adesidera



Category: Dimension 20 (Web Series), Fantasy High, Unsleeping City
Genre: As random as dice rolls, Bad Dads, Drabbles, High Fantasy AU, Kidnapping, Multi, So much pining that I call this the Pine Forest, knights in shining armor, prompts
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-12-17
Updated: 2020-02-15
Packaged: 2021-02-25 21:08:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 2,442
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21831964
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/adesidera/pseuds/adesidera
Summary: Drabbles and prompts from social media. Will add tags as this collections grows!
Relationships: Adaine Abernant/Figueroth Faeth, Riz Gukgak/Fabian Aramais Seacaster
Comments: 4
Kudos: 57





	1. His Unbearable Lightness - Riz/Fabian

He’s trying to find Fabian in the dark, his golden eyes nothing but blips in the dark, picking up no color but shades of grey. It’s the perfect metaphor really, this simple confession of his turning into an unmitigated disaster.

And Fabian is just up ahead of him, looking as lost and bewildered as he is. His eyes might not pick up any color, but Riz knows for a fact that he can overlay the exact shades to fill in what the darkness has taken. He knows the different shades of Fabian through the seasons, knows how dazzling and brilliant he is in splendor and victory, and how the very same lightness can be stolen from him at a moment’s beat, the mere lack of it in Fabian’s person inherently wrong.

It’s different here, Riz senses, a stillness absent in almost all of their misadventures.

When Fabian stands up, Riz’s eyes track the motion, something ethereal and otherworldly in the complete absence of Fabian’s usual bright palette of clothes, the fire engine red of his Aguefort letterman jacket is reduced to just another shade of grey, the dark denim of his jeans washes out to something darker. It should be impossible for someone to radiate light in this pitch-black pit, but it’s here where Fabian seems to glow with unbearable lightness, the silver of his hair a bright halo around his head.

He looks like one of the saints painted in stained-glass churches, heroic and heavenly in their legacies, and when the sun shines their colors are loud and riotous, embedding in Riz a sense of faith and longing, and for a moment he suddenly feels sympathy for Kristen. In the presence of gods and all-powerful deities in the world they live in, how awe-inspiring is it to behold something so mortal and other-worldly at the same time?

Riz boxes the moment and resolves to add this on the ever growing board he has set up for Fabian in his mind, all these moments all stringed together into this unidentifiable mess in Riz’s chest, messy and unanswered in the wake of the chaos they wrought. Fabian turns to him, that same unbearable lightness of his person turned and hyper-focused at Riz, making him squint to try and protect his eyes from the luminosity. Riz likens it to the sun bearing down on him in its intensity, harsh and golden. He desperately wonders at how he must look right now, a mere fool blinding himself by staring directly at the sun.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello! I should feel guilty for not doing the things I should, but it's gonna be 2020 soon and I figured I should do some spring cleaning with the piles of files rotting away on my laptop. 
> 
> I hope you guys like this collection of drabbles! These are all either unfinished blurbs or AUs that I haven't fleshed out. 
> 
> I also created a tumblr account because of this fandom,, and i feel like an old person using this website cause ive buried tumblr deep inside my mind. So don't be afraid to follow me to scream about my fics or suggest pairings (or teach me abt tumblr oh god everything's so new and shiny)! [@adesidera](https://www.adesidera.tumblr.com)


	2. Storming the Castle - Adaine/Fig

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _"What does your soul know to do?  
>  Does it know to pick up a spear, slay the dragon, burn this tower, and run away?  
> Or  
> Does it know to drop the dagger, train the dragon, plant some daisies, and make this tower a room of your own?_
> 
> \- A Poem for Women Who're Waiting to Be Rescued by [Milena Nguyen](https://milenanguyen.com/blog/2018/7/28/stop-waiting-to-be-rescue-by-a-prince-charming)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> set in a high fantasy au

An imposing figure clad in gleaming silver armor cuts through the crowd in the palace. People part like the Red sea to give way to this mysterious entity, as they quietly approach the throne of the royal couple. 

The knight stops and kneels before the king, and the hubbub of the whole room has now deafened into a tense quiet while the whole crowd waits with bated breath. The silence feels heavy and dangerous, a guillotine with a razor-sharp edge looming over the unsuspecting knight, head bowed and solemn.

The current king, King Abernant is not a nice man, he is as old as he is cruel, ruling this land long before most of the current citizens were even of age. He has made many an enemy in his long rule, and seeing this knight errant roam so freely sets him at an edge. He tightens his grip on his crystal goblet, and stands up, wine almost spilling out of his cups. The queen who sits by the king’s left looks beautiful and solemn by his side, her expression as still and serene as a frozen lake, the only thing giving her away was the slight crease by her brow as she looks worriedly at the unnamed knight kneeling before them. 

King Abernant nods to the stranger, “Speak now, mysterious traveler.”.

They are met with silence from the person in armor, they are stock still, heavy armor unmoving from their kneeling position. The crowd’s chatter increases in volume the longer the knight is silent, in awe and worry at this foreigner’s audacity to not follow the king’s direct order.

“Are you perhaps a commoner with no manners pretending to be a knight? Tell me now you foul vagrant, or else you shall lose your head for all this trouble you have wrought for trespassing on my land.”

This stirs the knight from their kneeling position, slowly moving one of their hands behind themself, reaching for something. The guards around the throne tense up at the motion, but the king holds them off with a raised hand, sensing no ill will from the stranger in front of them.

The knight takes out a small tattered scroll from their leather pack and unfolds it for the king to see. On the small scroll, a young woman is depicted with straw-blonde hair that is cropped just a bit past her chin, and has fine aristocratic features. If one was to look closer, the woman in the picture is clearly a descendant of royalty, a nice blend of features from both the . The knight stands up with their full height, armored head tilted ever so slightly towards the king, a mock challenge.

The letters are printed neatly onto the parchment, faded out with time and weathering, but the bold script that reads _Reward: 10,000 Gold_ can still be read clearly _._

King Abernant gives the knight a jerk of a nod and sits back down on his golden throne, and watches flint-eyed as the stranger departs. The crowd all turn to look at the stony-silent king, and the boisterous chatter resumes following the knight errant out of town like a shadow.

-

Once that they feel like they are deep enough in the forest, the one between the civilized part of the kingdom and the ruins of the previous one, the magic inside the forest welcomes the supposed visitor warmly, magic wrapping around the bulk of the armor. The shimmering settles onto the finely crafted iron and _transforms_. They shift and change, getting smaller and slimmer in its entirety, iron and flesh.

As the fanfare ends, somewhere near the edge of the forest, our knight takes off their helm. A tumble of long black locks fall from its confines, dark as the night, but almost as bright as her armor in the way that they reflected light. She faces the treacherous path before her, unflinching and determined, she walks on.

-

Heavy footsteps echo the ruins, the jostling of chain mail armor cuts through the eerie silence of one of the ruins of this once beautiful castle, the knight hears strange echoes carried by the wind, but whenever she tries to find the source she never catches a glimpse. This frustrates her more than the long journey towards this place, as long and tedious as it is. She just hates getting surprised by something she can not surprise right back, unused to being the unsuspecting victim of chaos instead of the other way around. 

Fig shouts at the abandoned wasteland of war and greed, “Adaine?”.

Getting no response, frustrated and tired, she shouts once again. ”Adaine, if you can hear me just shout back!” 

She has been on this journey for three suns and two moons past, just occasionally stopping to camp out and try to refresh her supplies. It’s been hard to do this alone, but her letters to her old adventuring party turned up nothing, and try as she might she didn’t have the foresight to keep some item of theirs to contact them through arcane means. She grew restless and antsy, and decided she would do this alone.

She grabs a bag of rolled cloves, and smokes the rest of the way.

As she nears the entrance, a big grand archway that threatens to swallow her whole with the pointed iron spikes, she feels another presence, something massive and _hot_. 

Fig is on the alert, the hair by her nape rising, and suddenly the ground beneath her feet is unsteady and _moving_ , as this massive beast comes at her with jaws open, an intense heat begins to swirl. She is facing a majestic creature, bronze scaled and sharp-spined. The wyvern is a near mythical entity in this world, and seeing one this size fills Fig with adrenaline. She ran forward, heart beating and skin taut with tension, and slashed forward with no hesitation. Her blade met the tough hide of its scales, unyielding. She feels her grip start to slip from perspiration and inexperienced hands, so she tries to out maneuver it instead, ducking behind some of the still-standing pillars.

The strong smell of brimstone and soot begin to surround her, and she takes her own drag from her clove cigar. When she comes out from cover to take another stab at the wyvern, she spots another human-like figure standing in front of the wyvern.

She takes a good look at this stranger, a petite frame in a loose tunic and trousers, and as her gaze travels upwards, she is met with the shock of cropped straw-blonde hair as familiar to her as any common sight.

“ _Adaine?!_ ”

The figure turns around abruptly, and Fig’s heart is filled with joy and excitement. Adaine’s face is inscrutable from this distance, so Fig makes the motion of going toward Adaine, but the bronze dragon scurries quickly over in-between Adaine and Fig, teeth bared towards Fig menacingly.  
  
Adaine gives Fig an apologetic shrug, and gestures toward the wyvern.

“Fig, this is Ayda.”

“Ayda, this is Fig.”

The wyvern cocks its head toward Adain as if in askance, and Adaine nods to the unvoiced question. Ayda sniffs at Fig's soot covered face, and gone was intensity from this mythical beast, who seemed to demure and turn playful in Adaine’s presence. Adaine motions for Fig to come closer, and Fig does, slowly at first like she was trying to test the waters. Each step Fig takes comes faster one after the other, and before she knows it she has Adaine wrapped up in her tight embrace. She buries her head in the crook of Adaine's neck, quietly basking in this peace they've achieved.

Fig looks at the smoke coming out of Ayda’s nostrils in skepticism, “She’s not gonna turn me into one of those fire acts in your kingdom right?”.  
  


Adaine giggles, light and free, and somehow, all is somewhat right in the world. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> !!ep 9 fhlive spoilers!!
> 
> finished it and cleaned it up because of today's fhlive episode, and emily's sheer power in keeping the ship alive with all those moments!!! but at the same time, i was also inspired by shrek, so take it how u want. 
> 
> scream at me or summ over on tumblr! [@adesidera](https://adesidera.tumblr.com/). I just want people to follow so my dash doesnt't look as empty gang gang.


	3. In Memoriam - Adaine/Fig

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _oracles, and the glass-ball weight of the world_

Adaine knows a lot about the weight of things, knows how it feels to carry a responsibility so big that you can feel it loom behind you. Her mind contains multiple thoughts at any given time, and it tends to wear her down sometimes. Just out of freshman year and she’s already bestowed the duty of being the elven oracle. A job she hasn’t asked for, but dumped on her plate unceremoniously, with everyone expecting her to just simply deal with it. She’s used to having people weigh her worth, whether that be her parents judging her every move, or Aelwen on her magical prowess.

So when Adaine feels the weight of Fig’s stare by her side, Adaine meets her gaze with an arched eyebrow.

Fig shrugs, and turns to look over the field. The silence between them is loaded, and whatever Fig was about to say, Adaine knows with a surety, will decide if they can ever come back from the aftermath. It’s been a weird summer, with all the time they’ve spent together, both as a group and alone together. It’s unsettling and frustrating in a similar way as when one of the tomes in her bookshelf are misplaced, not quite remembering the small stuff, when her whole schtick is reliant on her ability to _remember_ multiple things at multiple times in multi--

“I’ve never really cared about what other people think of me,” Fig starts, getting Adaine’s attention. She snorts at this, but Fig only narrows her eyes at Adaine and presses on. “But somehow, I kinda really care about what you’d think of me after.”

“After?”

They’re not hidden by anything at all, quite the opposite really, as they’re at the top seats in the bleachers, in clear view of everyone on campus. This should put Adaine on defense, ring alarm bells in her head-- the entire Bloodrush team is down there-- but Fig is quick as a flash of light as she moves into Adaine’s personal space. Adaine is strangely prepared for this, bracing herself for the impact, eyes closed for whatever trainwreck was about to happen ( _should happen, will happen_ ).

She expects it to be quintessentially Fig, brash and bold and passionate, but she’s surprised when she feels the feather-light press of Fig’s lips against her own.

Her surprise must’ve read differently to Fig who quickly backs away before Adaine can even register the motion, or even begin thinking about _reciprocating_ , and she feels strangely lost. Fig smiles at her softly and proceeds to jog down towards the Bloodrush team. 

This moment reminds her of her first day at Agueforth, of the glass ball that her father gave her before going to school, the heavy and delicate weight of something massive and precious in her hands. She’s afraid of holding on to the massive eyesore, her palms sweaty against the cool smooth glass surface, but she’s also afraid of letting go, letting the ball crash down by her feet, letting it all go tits up and leave the fractures of something so massive at her feet. 

“So,” Riz says from behind her, a hand scratching the back of his head and eyes trained toward the team, “that happened.” He walks toward her with the caution of a person approaching a scared animal, but Adaine only rolls her eyes at him and pats the space beside her. 

“Yeah,” She’s still dumbstruck by what happened, as she lets her fingers gently touch her lips, her eyes carefully tracking Fig’s movements as she talks with Gorthalax. “It did happen.”

They sit in silence for a moment, Adaine “Wanna talk about it?”   
  
“Unless you wanna talk about Ragh,” Riz suddenly looks panicked, and Adaine throws Riz a smug look. Riz looks equal parts indignant and amused, his face flushing at the mention of Ragh’s name. He’s as hopeless as her on that front then, she almost feels sorry enough for the both of them. He punches her on the shoulder gently, eyes soft, and he plops down with her.

They stay there for a while, sitting side by side, the glass-ball weight of the world gone from Adaine’s hands as she feels her equilibrium shift again as she slowly settles in and lets herself be.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> short burst of updates!!! im still catching up with the bad kids, but u can bet ur ass i already have a fig/ayda fic on the stove cooking for yall
> 
> i really just wanted more riz/adaine friendship moments yall
> 
> as always [@adesidera](https://www.adesidera.tumblr.com)


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